Gardaí investigating the death of man whose body was found in the Irish Sea looked into the possibility
it may have been related to drug debts, an inquest has heard.
Det Insp Kieran Holohan told the inquest into the death of Paul Byrne (25), who went missing from his home on Sandy Lane, Rush, north Co Dublin, on Christmas Day 2012, that the issue of drug debts arose after his disappearance.
“His girlfriend said he owed money to certain people. We probed that with them but they denied it. We took it as far as we could,” he told Dublin Coroner’s Court.
Mr Byrne's body was found on February 22nd last year as fishermen hauled in their nets on a trawler off the coast of Skerries. His disappearance had been the subject of several public appeals including an appearance by his mother Mary Byrne on RTÉ's Crimecall .
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Mr Byrne spent Christmas Eve at the home of his girlfriend Jenn Coffey before going back to his own house at a
bout 1am. Ms Coffey told the court that he “seemed happy” and there was “nothing bothering him”. However, on Christmas morning she received text messages from him indicating he was upset. These messages were deleted and could not be retrieved by gardaí, the court heard.
Stephen Byrne said in the months before he went missing his brother had been “down in himself”.
The alarm was raised by Mr Byrne’s housemate Gary Cruise and friend Dean Peters. He had been due to have Christmas dinner with Mr Peters’ family but did not turn up. Neither man was in court to give evidence.
In his deposition read into the record, Mr Cruise said when Mr Byrne returned to their home on Christmas Eve they were drinking, smoking cannabis and taking cocaine.
He told gardaí that Mr Byrne had become "real skinny" and a week before he disappeared he had told him that he was taking steroids to bulk up.
No sightings
In Mr Peters's deposition, also read into the record, he said
he had stayed the night in Mr Byrne’s house and when he knocked on his bedroom door about 10am he heard him mumble. After he failed to turn up for dinner, Mr Cruise said they returned to the house at 6pm and kicked in the bedroom door but Mr Byrne was not there.
Det Insp Holohan said there were no sightings of Mr Byrne after he was heard mumbling in his room; however, his mobile phone was powered on for a number of hours afterwards.
Through their investigation, gardaí formed the view he had taken his own life, Det Insp Holohan said. He agreed with coroner Dr Brian Farrell there was no evidence before the inquest as to “precisely what happened”.
The body was identified using DNA profiling and the postmortem was carried out by Deputy State Pathologist Dr Michael Curtis.
Length of time
However, Dr Farrell said the examination was limited due to the length of time that passed before the body was recovered. He told the family
Dr Curtis had given drowning as a “presumptive” cause of death.
The inquest was adjourned for further hearing on June 3rd after Mrs Byrne said she would like to hear evidence in person from people present in her son’s house the night before his disappearance.